


Another One Gone

by navaan



Category: Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: Ficlet, Gen, Goodbyes, Introspection, Missing Scene, Terminus
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-04
Updated: 2010-04-04
Packaged: 2017-10-13 00:55:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/131019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/navaan/pseuds/navaan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tegan's thoughts about Nyssa's decision to leave them and a short glimpse she gets into the Doctor's true feelings about companions leaving</p>
            </blockquote>





	Another One Gone

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place at the end of _Terminus_. Written for 10_shakespeare challenge at lj with the promt Hamlet/ _Adieu, adieu, adieu. Remember me._

Typical, Tegan thought. Not only for the Doctor in this youthful and sometimes naively well mannered - not when it came to herself, mind you - regeneration. He was so unlike the man she had only known for a short time before that. But no, she thought, it was oh so typical for all of them.

She had been running, crawling and climbing for her life all day with Turlough - who in her opinion should have never been allowed to join them on board the TARDIS. And Nyssa, the friend she had been worried for all day, seemed to have gone through hell and come back to form a shocking conclusion.

Tegan wasn't ready to accept her decision at all.

Nyssa, who had been the buffering element between herself and the Doctor in all their arguments, wanted to leave them to stay in this awfull place. She just couldn't believe it.

Nyssa had made no sign of feeling uncomfortable with their travelling around the universe. Although she had admitted to her once that she was hoping to find a way to use her Trakenite heritage to do something good – so she would not let her dead people be forgotten.

But that Nyssa would consider leaving the Doctor after all was just something Tegan couldn't understand. She had been happy on the Tardis and now she would chose a life of hardship over travelling the universe?

Tegan herself had been _left_ behind. _After_ she had been going on about nothing but wanting to return to Heathrow, her job, her normal life. And she had felt _abandoned, adrift_. She couldn't begin to imagine how the younger girl could even consider staying on Terminus where setbacks and deaths would be the only things she would be surrounded by. And Tegan just didn't want any of that for Nyssa - her beautiful, graceful and still so very young friend.

She turned to the Doctor hoping that he would be the one to talk some sense into the girl But the Doctor only looked wide-eyed and calm at the same time. He listened to Nyssa's reasons and asked if she knew what her decision would mean in the long run. He made sure she had made an informed decision, but didn't contest her reasoning in any way.

It made Tegan furious. She could see that he would let her go, although Nyssa had always been his favourite. The Doctor did not seem to want to hold her back from shaping her own life. 

Predictably he looked ruffled after the talk and all of a sudden Tegan didn't know if she could really be angry at him. She was sure Nyssa could only die here and it irked her that the Doctor would not even put up a fight. But the way the Doctor gave in showed that he was proud of Nyssa's courage, that he respected her decision. He was proud but dismayed, and he did try very hard not to show it.

In the Doctor's eyes Nyssa was to be trusted to make the right decision, and like a proud father he would let her go - even if it meant she had to stand on her own against all odds.

It was only later, when Tegan watched the Doctor go through the lab that the girl from Traken had left behind, that she got a glimpse of the complexity of the Doctors feelings. He stood there eerily still and just stared with unseeing eyes at the things around him. He looked like someone going through the belongings of a family member that had only recently passed away. It frightened her a little.

It was just not normal for the Doctor to do nothing, to just stand still. The man she knew could never keep still. And Tegan suddenly understood: Leaving someone behind, or being left by one of his fellow travellers was not something to be brushed off – even if it seemed that the Doctor could just walk on like he so often did. She had seen the process after Adric's death. But they had all been too shocked to give much thought to the Doctor's motives of moving on.

“She will be all right, you know, Tegan?”

Tegan nearly jumped out of her skin, when the Doctor addressed her. He hadn't moved from his position and was not looking at her.

“How do you know?”

He was starring right ahead as if he was seeing something. A ghost? A memory? “Oh, I know,” he said with resigned conviction. He didn't elaborate on it but Tegan was sure that he _did_ know. She had know idea how he could know things like these, but she had learned to trust his words. She would never get used to the fact that the Doctor was more alien than he looked or let on...

With a nod to himself he continued to explain: “She will not die on Terminus, but she will have made a difference. Then she will go on to lead a happy life, start a family somewhere. She has grown up so much, don't you think? She has earned to have a fulfilled life, surely?”

“Yes, Doctor. She has a right to live her own life. It's good to know she will be happy. But it feels as if she's dead to me. We'll never see her again. I'll miss her..”

“So will I, Tegan. So will I. But we won't forget her.”

And how many people did he miss already? How many ghost of the past haunted his memories? She didn't dare voice the question.

“Alas, where do you want to go next?” He finally turned around to look at her, his face animated again, his voice cheery. “No reason to linger in the vortex, is there now? There is still so much to see.”


End file.
